Welcome to Frank’s Firewood of Boonville California

EST. 1972, Frank’s Firewood is owned and operated by Frank and Jolene Vaine. Our Firewood processing yard is very mechanized, and we have a large source of raw material which will allow us to continue in business for as long as Frank is still breathing

We see our Oak firewood as a very renewable energy source - trees that are fast growing and re-sprouting.

Where do our Trees come from?

Tan Oak and Madrone are fast growing hardwoods that have overtaken many forested areas. This was due to poor conifer regeneration methods after heavy conifer logging in the past. These are the basic areas where we get our trees.

The CA. Dept. of Forestry requires by law that if an area is overrun with hardwoods. landowners cannot simply take out more conifers without reducing the amount of hardwoods. It would be like having a garden of which you only pick the vegetables, but never take out the weeds. One would soon have no more vegetables.

Tan Oaks and Madrones are basically too poor of quality to mill into lumber. What isn’t used for firewood in this county is currently being fallen or poisoned and left to rot out in the forest, which hampers reforestation efforts.

Firewood is currently the only realistic use for them, so you might appreciate that by using these types of hardwoods, you’re using wood that’s beneficial to the forest to be removed.

An average of 45,000 Redwood and Douglas Fir trees are successfully replanted each year by Mendocino Redwood CO. in place of the Tan Oaks and Madrones that are removed for Frank’s Firewood.

Please note that although some Oaks do have a slightly higher density, species such as Blue Oak or Live Oak or White Oak are not as realistically renewable. They grow only in hotter range-lands inland, and seedlings cannot get started due to the state’s current deer and cattle population. When they’re cut, they don’t re-sprout. When seedlings do get started, such as along the highway corridors their slow growth rate is only an average of 10” - 18”/ 100 yrs. ( The deer population is kept to a minimum along highway corridors because of the automobile- their main predator).